Hawkeye first appeared in the Marvel Cinematic Universe in Thor, and then returned to play bad guy at first in Avengers (under Loki's control) and then coming good to take his rightful place as an Avenger for the climax of the film. This Marvel Select release is Hawkeye as seen in 2012 in the Avengers. Hawkeye looks lost in the huge box that Diamond uses for all his figures, and arrives with the usual box artwork and write up of the figure and the film. Hawkeye is packed in with a bow, one loose arrow, and a base piece which we will talk about later. Hawkeye stands 6.5 inches high, putting him as the smallest of the Avengers released so far by Diamond. I am not sure if this is actually two small, and need to put him alongside the upcoming Black Widow to be sure. The sculpt is pretty good all round, with a decent facial resemblance for Jeremy Renner. The first issue with the figure crops up straight away though as Clint comes without his iconic sunglasses. Granted in the film he is without them most of the time, but the sunglasses look was used in a lot of the film marketing. Having supplied other figures with two heads, it wouldnt have hurt to give fans an option of a sunglasses head. Hawk's body armour is nicely done with a SHIELD logo sculpted into the chest piece. His bare arms are sculpted similar to Thor's with some muscle definition., The legs contain some nice strap detail and the boots are also nicely done with various straps and buckles. My only gripe is the usual articulation over look, with the articulation they have used on his hips making them look a bit odd in that his thighs suddenly shrink where they meet his groin. Onto the hands and in particularly the left one which is sculpted with the shooting glove. This is right I hear you say, which it is absolutely - but then have a look at the position of his quiver? The quiver is positioned as though Hawkeye would draw with his right hand and hold the bow with his left. Pretty poor attention for detail. Thankfully the quiver, nicely sculpted as it is, is a separate piece and with some heat it can be twisted to face the right way (as it has been on all my pictures below). The right hand and wrist itself is also missing the strapping that Hawkeye wears in the film, replaced instead by what looks like a single sweat band Articulation includes the head swivel, and he can actually get almost a whole 180 degree motion with his head to look both left or right. Shoulders are jointed and then go into a bicep swivel and elbow joint, finally you can rotate the wrists - this means that with some patience you can get Clint into a half decent arching position, well at least stringing an arrow if not looking like he is about to let one fly, There are ball jointed hips and knee articulation but no thigh swivel on this one. He also comes with the ankle rockers to help stability. I cant find any paint issues, with nice skin tone and nice detail to the armour with a degree of shading. The zips, belts and buckles are also all picked out nicely in silver even down to lace holes in both boots. The bow is pretty nice and fits in either hand. It is plain black, but with some red detail around the hand grip. The sole arrow is a nice touch. Although you cant get Hawk to hold it securely you can prop it into a "stringing my bow" position and can get him into a pose where he looks like he is drawing that arrow from his quiver - but only if you keep the quiver on the wrong side. Hawkeye comes with another of Diamond's scenery pieces, this time with what is meant to be an iron railing. It's OK, but it isnt brilliant - and a trick was certainly missed not making it wall hangable and a bit wider so Hawkeye can actually stand on it properly and aim his bow. The piece links up to an identical piece that comes with the Chitauri to make a larger scenery piece - the issue here (not pictured) is that the Chitauri piece is painted differently so they look really odd when placed together, I am really pleased Diamond gave us Hawkeye and that they are brave enough to go with secondary and even tertiary characters. It would have been dead easy for them to use one of their Avengers slots in 2012 for another Cpt America or a re-released Thor. I would love to score Hawkeye highly, but you have to look at the flaws like the hip joints and the quiver position. That drops Hawkeye to 3 out of 5.
